


Fallen Deities

by PalaeoPanthalassa



Category: The Dark Crystal (1982)
Genre: AU, Coercion, Dreamfasting, Gen, Norya just wants to do the right thing., Skeksis - Freeform, TDC-Legends-verse (consider it an AU), depressed urskeks, explanation of Legends-verse inside, its not like i wrote an nsfw version that I'm too shy to share or anything XD, skekLach is a big smug bastard and he knows it, skeksis/gelfling sort of if you squint but it's more like tension if anything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-15
Updated: 2019-08-15
Packaged: 2020-09-01 08:08:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20254936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PalaeoPanthalassa/pseuds/PalaeoPanthalassa
Summary: (Legends-verse AU; see inside for explanation) Twice four centuries ago the Crystal was cracked, and the shard was lost to the lands of Thra. If only that shard could be found then by gelfling hand the Crystal would be restored and the skeksis rule ended. Soon after the start of the Garthim Wars, a band of gelflings make a desperate bid to heal the Crystal. The mission goes awry. Left behind, Norya now must navigate herself around the one skeksis that knows she's there.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So, I am super excited for Age of Resistance, which will be out later this month. But one dissapointment is that it was revealed one of my favourite skeksis (and the one who I had looked forward most to seeing on the big screen) had been completely retconned in every conceivable way (not just his appearance, but his complete personality, hobbies, and even his gender). I am of course not writing off AoR-Lach as a character, but let's just face it, it's not the same character in any form but name. I had started writing this fic a few years ago but never finished it, so I thought to myself why not come back and write it? And why not make it completely Legends-verse? Don't just write it with the one change being og skekLach, but totally immerse myself in Legends-verse canon, which differs so much from the recent novels and AoR. Write it as an AU, have fun, and share what you write. Maybe someone else might also appreciate a nostalgic look at Legends, and what might have been. I've written this short story as a starter to a much bigger tale, one which I don't actually intend to write (at least at this time). It's more like a teaser to a fanfic that might have been. ;)
> 
> Brief explanation of Legends-verse:  
-Legends-verse is primarily set within the "Legends of the Dark Crystal" manga, but can borrow elements from the film and World as they had been released prior. (I did borrow one minor element from the JM Lee novels in making skekLach a Census Taker in his earlier days)  
-Even though technically still considered canon (somehow?? I don't get it either), Legends-verse canon actually contradicts a lot of recent canon, but as any veteran TDC fan will tell you, almost none of the stories and comics actually align so this isn't such a big deal XD  
-Key differences that need to be kept in mind when reading this story are:  
\--Gelflings are not just peaceful but naturally fully pacifist creatures who find the idea of making or using weapons as truly alien and obscene, but since the start of the Garthim Wars they have begun to make makeshift (crappy) weapons which they are still learning to use.  
\--SkekLach (og skekLach) here is very different from the AoR depiction of him. He is the skeksis' tactian/strategist, currently primarily involved in organising and planning the garthim raids. He is a big, extremely crafty and politically powerful skeksis, who loves nothing more than collecting and preparing trophies (particularly of large or dangerous animals), eating food, charming the Emperor and being a big overbearing bastard to everyone else. His visage is distinct, he has only one eye, the left is rendered useless by an immense scar, he is also missing his left arm from the elbow down and has it replaced with a fully metallic construct, and has a distinct beard which he keeps tied beneath his chin.  
\--The Garthim Wars started 800 years after the Great Division.  
\--The skeksis first set the garthim upon the gelflings completely unprovoked, before the prophecy was made. It was roughly 50 years before any gelfling would dare attempt to fight back, and during this time all gelfling villages became nomadic.  
\--There are no gelfling races, they are all of the same heritage, just split between different villages/tribes (e.g. Greengrove, Redleaf)  
\--A gelfling boyfriend or girlfriend is referred to as a mate. The Castle of the Crystal is referred to as the Crystal Palace/Castle. Skeksis titles are arranged this way: "Collector skekLach", rather than "SkekLach the Collector". Tribe and village are synonymous, and are an archaic term, instead referring to nomadic groups of gelflings. And female gelflings have wings from birth.  
-I think that covers all the essentials necessary for the story, follow this link for a full detailed explanation of all differences if you want. * https://www.deviantart.com/zurelazuli/art/Legends-verse-of-TDC-Differences-And-Additions-809741056?ga_submit_new=10%3A1565868212 *

As the last of the three suns’ light faded and the sky became a deep hazy blue, five cloaked figures could just barely be seen scaling the side of the Crystal Palace, blending in with the dark stony walls under the cover of darkness. The five gelflings slipped into the palace unseen, faces hidden beneath their hoods they kept to shadows as they headed ascended yet deeper into the fortress.

One of them immediately broke away from the others, moving ahead, her pale pink doe-like ears just barely peeking out from beneath her hood. Norya hurried, crouched close to the ground, an eye-shaped charm clasped tightly in one hand against her chest, she repeatedly ran her thumb over it in mantra, eyes fixed forward as she tried not to let her anxiety show. She knew she was by no stretch of the imagination a leader of any sort, she was the scout. Fleet-footed and excelling at evading attention.

It’s just she normally did those things while running the _opposite_ direction from danger, not heading towards it!

Norya paused at the junction in the hallway, listening keenly she scanned the darkness for movement. In the distance, she could already faintly hear the skeksis, still far away enough to be safe but not far enough not to cause her alarm. She shakily raised an arm to signal to the others that the coast was clear.

They hurried up to her.

One placed their hand upon her shoulder, it was Eida, the team leader. She was a tough old gelfling with a sunbeaten face and wild wiry hair, Eida had been to the palace before, not by choice of course, having barely escaped with her life after breaking free of a garthim basket. She had been the only one to get away. Even in the dark, though Norya knew Eida could not quite see her face, she got the distinct impression that her leader was scrutinising her, looking for any sign of uncertainty.

She pat the hand reassuringly and forced a smile, which Eida likely could not see. Norya was not a warrior, but none of them were. Until recently no gelfling would have ever willingly raised a weapon, but then had come the Garthim Wars.

The garthim could be killed it had been revealed, a shepherd by the name of Lahr had proved that, it was the first time the gelflings had ever tried to fight back since the skeksis had unexpectedly turned on them some fifty trine before.

Norya was a story-teller, but a minstrel without an instrument, an oddity for a gelfling where music was the very beating heart of life itself. But then again, Norya felt that she was a bit of an oddity in many ways.

Eida silently gestured to the group the direction they were now headed, up a narrow stairwell carved in dark stone. Norya stared uncertainly up this stairwell anxiously, until Eida gave her a gentle shove and she remembered what she was meant to be doing. Norya hurried ahead of the others again, cheeks burning.

The anxiety she felt right now was almost overwhelming, the amount of responsibility that had been put on her shoulders with this mission felt near crippling, so much so that Norya feared more than anything else – even more than the skeksis themselves – letting the others down.

She really was not used to travelling in groups.

_Focus_, she told herself, _focus, this is important, this could be a turning point in history to be remembered for many centuries to come! A story you could witness first-hand!_

And this was true, if things went as planned, everything would be better.

Around fifty trine before, the skeksis had first turned on them. Around fifty trine ago the garthim had first appeared, and their effect had been devastating. Where there had once been many fixed gelfling villages, now all were nomadic groups, constantly on the move and in constant fear of being raided by the garthim. The skeksis wanted every single last one of them dead.

Around fifty trine ago a prophecy had been made that the skeksis reign would come to an end if the Crystal was healed by a gelfling. All that was required was the missing shard. But no one knew where the shard was, and the prophecy itself was up to interpretation as so much of the earlier history of the Crystal was unknown.

When the skeksis had first appeared they had presented themselves as guardians left behind by the urskeks, otherworldly beings of incomprehensible wisdom, to care for all of Thra. The strange thing was that the other than the skeksis’ word, there was no evidence or even any suggestion that the urskeks had ever planned or intended to leave anyone in their stead. No one knew where the skeksis had come from, they had simply appeared one day.

Some believed the skeksis had actually usurped the urskeks by brute force, Norya herself was convinced that the skeksis must have killed them, and that the gelflings, naïve fools they had been back then, had taken the skeksis word as truth without a shred of evidence.

The quintet had reached the top of the stairwell now, and were headed out onto narrow terrace overlooking a large chamber, which even in this darkness glowed faintly at its heart.

_The Crystal…_

“By the Bright Light!” exclaimed Ilta, one of a pair of twins, unable to hide the awe in her voice, the others murmuring in agreement; Eida hurriedly hushed them and stalked over to stand beside Norya.

“About time we got out of this damned dark,” she huffed quietly. “You think it’s clear?”

“Well, no one is here,” Norya replied, turning her head towards the distant sounds of clinking cutlery and roaring laughter. “I think we caught them right in the middle of a meal.”

“That’s the best we can hope for,” Eida said gruffly and turned to the others. “To your positions, we are making our move!”

Eida led them out of the alcove and onto one of the small terraces that overhung the chamber. She opened her wings silently and glided down, landing atop of the Crystal. There was a heart-stopping moment in which it looked like she might slip, sandaled feet scrabbling against its glassy surface, but then Eida sat up perfectly and raised her hand gesturing to them.

It was the go ahead sign, they all opened their wings and glided down. Norya descended last, instinctively running her thumb over the eye-like charm hanging loosely around her neck one last time for good luck.

“Sheero!”

A lanky yet surprisingly tall gelfling made her way over to the Crystal, first holding up and then tossing the bag she had had secured around her neck to Eida. Norya heard a distinctive clinking of crystal against crystal as their leader caught the bag.

It was said that when the Crystal had first been cracked, the shard had flown high over the palace and been lost to Thra. It had been more than twice four centuries since then, and they had had a long time to look since then.

But every shard they had seen looked so much like the other, all beautiful, all the pristine and clear, and they had no way of knowing if one or any of the crystals was _the _shard they sought.

Within tall Sheero’s nondescript bag were six shards, each with a unique history of its own, all treasured in times passed before their potential significance could have been guessed at.

Tonight would be about finding out if they truly had _the _shard.

Their lives, and that of all gelflings, depended on it.

Norya watched Eida, mesmerised, as she raised and try to fit the first of the shards into the jagged wound in the Crystal’s surface.

_Nothing._

Ilta gave her a gentle nudge, reminding her to focus and not get distracted. Norya smiled apologetically and turned away from the crystal, facing the direction in which she could hear the distant sounds of the banquet. She could just about see the bulky outline of a garthim at the far end of the corridor leading out from the Crystal Chamber, but there was no glow in its eyes, no movement at all. It had yet to be activated.

The sight still filled her with terror.

Like all gelfling, Norya had seen and feared garthim, but she had yet to see a skeksis. And as she heard their distant baying laughter, she hoped she never would.

Behind her she could hear sighs and huffs of disappointment as one shard after the next failed to fit the crack in the Crystal.

“Perhaps it has to be a Great Conjunction for the shard to fit?” Jina, Ilta’s twin sister, suggested.

“If that is true then gelfling-kind is doomed,” hissed Ilta. “We cannot wait another two

centuries, there won’t be any of us left!”

“Hush, both of you!” Eida hissed from her perch. “There are still one more to go!”

Suddenly, something flew in through the open skylight above the Crystal, all five of them looking up as it vanished against the dark ceiling.

But Norya already knew it was a Crystal Bat, having seen the light of the Crystal just faintly reflecting off the gem it held to its clawed belly.

Not a second later, the moonlight above was blotted out as Crystal Bats began to pour in through the open skylight, a cacophony of screeching and chittering as they flew around the chamber like a tornado, their bony wings and furry bodies striking and scratching against the gelflings in a panicked frenzy. Norya was able to avoid the worst of the battering by crouching close to the ground, but Eida, balanced atop of the Crystal, was knocked off balance.

“EIDA!” Norya screamed.

Sheero was only just able to catch their leader in time, yanking her back so that they both fell upon the floor. Norya hurried over to help the two of them up as the screeching Crystal Bats began to noisily fly out of the chamber and down the corridors, awakening garthim as they went.

“We’re going!” Eida immediately shouted over the screeching of the bats. “Draw swords, and stick together!”

The other quickly did as they were told, drawing forth their fire-hardened wooden weapons and bunching together.

All except Norya, who was having trouble, having repeatedly tried to yank her sword from its scabbard by her hip but it still wouldn’t budge, in her blind fear she didn’t realise why until she looked down and saw that there was still a strap fastened over the top of it to prevent it coming loose.

Something was charging through the bats towards them now.

Norya’s first sight of a skeksis, was a shadowy shape in a black cloak with a jagged spiky carapace, barrelling towards them snarling, almost animal-like in how close he held himself to the ground. She knew the other skeksis couldn’t be far behind.

“The garthim!” Eida barked at them. “The garthim are broad and slow, if we can get past them the skeksis will be slowed in these narrow corridors, they will not be able to pass as easily!”

It sounded like suicide but it made sense, and seeing the dreadful hissing skeksis in black stop, pulling back one hand to lob something at them, Norya gave up on trying to draw her sword and ran after the others, Eida following last.

A deep clanging bell had started to be rung somewhere higher up in the palace, the sound reverberating through the halls, and beneath it all she could hear the screeching and booming voices of the skeksis getting closer.

Norya was already dodging amongst the barrel-like bodies of the garthim as the metal hunters flailed in confusion in the narrow confines of the hallway, striking one another repeatedly as they fought to attack the fleeing gelflings.

Ilta and Jina both ran ahead of her unscathed. But Sheero was flung past them all at high speed, striking her head against the wall.

The three of them grabbed her and pulled her up to run with them, and despite her violent flight, Sheero was able to carry on, but she was hurt, and not just from a head injury. Sheero had fallen against her own drawn sword, stabbing herself in the thigh, Norya could see the dark bloom spreading across the material of her dress even in the dark.

“Come on! Just hold on until we’re out!” Ilta urged Sheero as they ran.

Eida’s plan seemed to have worked, the skeksis voices were becoming more distant now and Norya could hear their enraged bellows, having been slowed down by the garthim. Everything would be okay, she told herself, they just needed to get to a window now and glide down, being so high up in the palace already they would be able to cover a lot of distance, maybe even make it as far as the woods, then they would be able to take cover amongst the trees.

It felt weird not to have Eida running in their lead.

Norya looked back expecting for their leader not to be far behind them, but there was not a trace of her.

“Where is Eida?!” she cried out in alarm, stumbling to a halt. The others looked back, faltering, Jina colliding with her twin.

“She must have fallen behind,” Ilta was gesturing frantically for them all to continue running. “She’ll catch up when she can, she wouldn’t want us to stop. We could all be caught!”

“We can’t leave her!” Norya looked back, frantically racking her brains for when Eida could have fallen. She had been the last to leave the Crystal Chamber, what if she had never gotten out? The terrifying visual of the skeksis in black dragging Eida away flickered in her mind.

“We have no choice! Do you want us and Sheero to die too?” Ilta said firmly.

“If she’s safe then she will catch up with us,” Jina echoed her twin.

Norya felt torn, but there was no time for that, she could hear the garthim getting closer.

“Go on without me,” she found herself saying, she was backing up before she realised it, her heart in her throat. “I c-can’t leave her behind! I can’t lose her!”

“Don’t be an idiot, Norya, do you think she would want you to go back for her?” Ilta scolded her.

“No,” Norya was fighting back tears. “She wouldn’t-”

Suddenly she felt her feet leave the floor, choking at the sudden crushing pressure around her neck and chest as she was lifted by the back of her cloak and shirt, she would have shrieked but her voice seemed to get stuck in her throat. She thought it was a garthim until her back struck thick cloth, and she looked up. A huge skeksis loomed over her, a massive scar running over one sightless milky-white eye, jagged teeth protruding from a crooked maw.

For just a split second Norya froze in shock. She had heard rumour that skeksis ate gelflings, and right now she didn’t doubt that!

Norya kicked frantically, twisting in their grip she was able to grasp the skeksis’ hand, beneath her fingers it felt paradoxically both bony and leathery at once-

Without warning, a clear vision filled her mind.

_Dazzling tall white towers and pillars as far as the eye could see. She was floating, not just gliding down but ascending upwards against gravity without wings. Above a sea of light, it was blinding in its intensity, and-_

The skeksis dropped her as if she was scalding to the touch, and a gelfling darted forward, pulling Norya to her feet and running with her. It was Eida.

“Eida, I thought we had lost you!” Norya cried out as soon as she had overcome her disorientation, Eida didn’t reply, only silently shoving at her to keep her running.

Despite the close encounter, they quickly managed to lose the skeksis amongst the winding corridors. The big scarred skeksis hadn’t even tried to follow them. Perhaps it was awaiting back-up, Norya reasoned.

She still felt in a daze about the accidental dreamfast.

Or at least, that is what she thought that vision had to have been.

It wasn’t just that dreamfasting was generally meant to be impossible outside of gelflings, especially not with a skeksis – that was completely unheard of!

It was for her, who in greatest of all of her oddities had never been able to dreamfast with anyone.

_What had she even seen just then?!_


	2. Chapter 2

“Where are we?” Jina of the others exclaimed several minutes later. “Eida, where are we?”

“We’re going in circles!” cried Sheero.

“Eida?”

They all looked back to Eida for guidance, Norya felt her heart drop as she finally noticed the state their leader was in. Eida’s normally warmly coloured face was sheet-white, she was leaning awkwardly to one side, a small strange blade jutted out from her left shoulder, her left arm hanging limply by her side.

“I thought this was the way,” Eida told them apologetically, grimacing she collapsed.

Jina immediately ran to her, but Norya felt as if her own feet were frozen to the ground as she surveyed the scene, jaw clenched, this was all too much for her.

“She’s okay, she’s just weak,” Jina reassured the rest of them. “She’ll be fine if we can get her bandaged up and back home.”

“That damned skeksis in black, the Spy-master skekEer,” Eida cursed weakly. “He struck me just as I was leaving the Crystal Chamber!”

“Don’t worry Eida, we’re getting you out of here,” Ilta assured her.

“C-can she still glide?” Norya asked quietly. The other three all looked at her, and she shrank back before them.

“It’s best to be realistic,” Eida told them. “The answer is no, I cannot.”

“And in my state, I doubt I will be able to land safely,” Sheero added, indicating her wounded left and head injury. “At least you’re not alone, Eida.”

Eida slapped at Sheero’s good leg.

“W-we’ll fix this!” Norya forced herself to smile. “All we need to do is reach a lower floor, somewhere the drop isn’t too far, you’ll be able to both manage that, right?”

Sheero looked hopeful, Eida still looked glum.

“We can walk if not…” Norya added, her forced confidence quickly fading, hurrying over now to offer Eida her shoulder.

“If we glide from a lower level none of us will make it to the cover of the trees,” Eida said matter-of-factly.

“We’re not giving up on-” Norya began to say.

“No, we are NOT giving up,” Eida agreed, taking her arm. “But we have to be realistic. Three of you can still glide, so follow the original escape plan. I and Sheero will tend to our wounds and hide, tomorrow night we’ll make our way out under the cover of darkness.”

Norya ears twitched, she could hear the garthim not far away, disbanded by the skeksis to cover more ground, they were getting closer every second.

“Can you stand on your own?” Ilta asked Eida.

“I will be fine,” was a definite no, as Eida leant heavily against Norya to stay upright.

“I’ll stay with them!” Norya said to the twins. “I’ll bandage them up, and escape with them tomorrow.”

“Norya,” Eida began to protest.

“We’ll act as distraction!” Ilta snapped her fingers and Jina nodded enthusiastically. “While their attention is on us, the three of you can slip away to hide! If we’re lucky they will think we all fled at the same time.”

“Fine! Just don’t do anything stupid,” Eida told them weakly. “Keep to the shadows, and make your way to the river. Don’t wait up for us. Norya, this is your decision.”

Norya nodded shakily. “I’m not leaving you behind.”

“Good luck,” the twins wished them.

“You too,” Eida said stoically to them. “We’ll meet again.”

The two siblings nodded determinedly, and holding hands they began to run back towards where they could hear the skeksis approaching. The twins began to shout and whoop, throwing insults at the skeksis to get their attention. Norya could only feel despair at the selfless bravery of the two, shivering as she heard the skeksis spot them and give chase.

She managed to wrangle her thoughts together for a brief moment, she had a job to do and worrying would have to wait for later. Supporting Eida, she began to head down to the lower sublevels of the palace, where it was darker still, but where they were much less likely to be seen or found, and where there were many more places to hide. Sheero limping after them.

\-------

The night was long over, and it had to be well into the next day. But with how low the light levels were down here, Norya couldn’t guess what time of day.

The three of them were hidden in a large crevice, one of many, in a rocky wall, several sublevels below the palace. The dusty floor here was much less even, as if carved straight out of the rocky ground itself, stalactites and stalagmites crew from the ceiling and floor in many places. Down here there was very little noise, it was a stale, still, shadowy place, desolate and abandoned. Though it was clear these levels had once seen use, there were still beams supporting the walls and even tattered fragments of old faded fabric hung in places, it looked as if that had been many decades before, if not centuries.

Norya had done her best to tend to the wounds of the others. Sheero was still in pain and had a horrific bruise over the right side of her face, but her leg wound hadn’t been as bad as initially feared, the blade had avoided any major veins or arteries. There had been some fear of brain swelling at first as Sheero had complained of an agonising headache and seeing lights dancing in her vision, Norya was no healer but she had always made it her business to try to learn as much as she could about everything and had kept a close eye on her overnight a she slept to make sure she didn’t go into seizure. Fortunately, when Sheero had next awoken many hours later, she had felt a bit better, though by a bit better she had meant she still felt like she had been trampled by a herd of mounders. Norya had made sure she drank and ate something, and once she had been assured they were both warm enough she almost immediately fallen asleep herself out of sheer emotional and physical exhaustion. Leaving Sheero to keep watch.

Eida had lost a lot of blood and had been sleeping fitfully ever since the makeshift bandages had been applied, and the only thing Norya could do for her had been to offer her sips of water when she had woken up, which had been often.

They had no way of knowing what had happened to the others, and they had avoided speaking about the twins since, focusing on keeping themselves alive for now. Norya hoped in her heart that they had gotten away, she had neurotically ran her thumb over her eye-pendant exactly three times in hope that it would grant them luck and safe passage, and hoping her prayers would be heard by the Crystal, then done this again three times for good measure. Then Eida had given her a confused look, and Norya had tucked the charm away into her shirt, embarrassed.

For now it seemed the backup plan had worked, the night had passed and they were unscathed, or at least not any more than they had been when they had first gone into hiding. Then…

“You’ve lost a button,” Sheero had remarked.

Norya looked at her confused.

“I haven’t got any buttons.”

“The decorative ones on your sleeves, the black ones.”

Norya followed to where Sheero was pointing and noticed a line of small black fluffy pompoms running along the sleeves of her shirt on either shoulder. She was certain that this shirt had never had such additions before. She picked at one, testing the give it had on the material, immediately several small tendrils materialised as the button fought to keep itself in place.

Norya let go of it in an instant.

“They’re alive!” she muffled her shriek with her hands, then swiping frantically to try to pull them off. “What are they? Parasites!?”

“Might be,” Sheero gave her a worried look. “Lots of animals running around this palace, feeding off of food scraps left by the skeksis. But I’ve heard rumour that some skeksis learnt soul speech in the early days, when skeksis and gelflings were still on peaceful terms. And that they can control animals to do their bidding!”

“You mean like to track us down?” she asked, feeling as if her heart had fallen into her stomach. “That would mean they could know exactly where we were hiding! We’ve got to leave, now!”

“We need to wait until sundown,” Sheero said softly looking back at where Eida was sleeping. “We’d never make it out of here in daylight, they would see us in and instant and we would be run down by the garthim. We don’t know for sure those creatures are spy-beasts.”

“It’s a risk either way,” Norya agreed. “Night cannot come soon enough.”

Sheero had nodded grimly.

\-------

Norya had kept guard by the entrance to the crevice since then, as hours had passed and she lost no further “buttons” or even knew if she had ever had all of them to begin with, she dared to feel hopeful. The evening was surely here by now, she would set out soon to check for the arrival of night.

Eida was still sleeping, while Sheero had figured out how to make a make-shift crutch from Eida’s sword; having lost her own during the mad dash the night before.

But Norya, sitting closer to the caves than them with her cloak wrapped tightly around herself, could hear something now.

At first she thought she was imagining it, the sound was so faint and distant. But as it gradually grew closer and louder, she began to panic.

Someone was coming, definitely skeksis, she could hear their robes dragging along the ground, though there appeared to only one of them she couldn’t be sure, and she hoped and pleaded that this meant the skeksis could not know they were here. If they somehow did, surely they would all come running, or more likely they would have sent a pack of their garthim hunters.

Why would only one skeksis come down here? Unless it was the terrifying Spy-Master again, sent to quickly dispatch of them? Norya wondered if the spy-beasts have attached themselves to her when she had been in the Crystal Chamber, she had a vague memory of him lobbing something at them.

“I think someone is coming,” Norya crawled over to the others. “What do I do?!”

Only Sheero heard her, Eida was asleep. Sheero gave her a helpless shrug.

They were still getting closer.

Norya realised that if they were found she would have to make a choice. The others could not run, so she had to protect them no matter how scared the thought made her! But just staying here and fighting would get them all killed, she would have to go out and act as a distraction, just like the twins had done, and lead the skeksis away from the others, and just hope that she would be able to escape and then return later. That was if the skeksis even knew there were gelfling still in the palace, in which case even being seen would be hugely dangerous because it would put the entire palace on the alert again.

What if the skeksis had just been sent to double check there was no one hiding? Then what should she do? Hide and hope they weren’t found, but risk losing everything if they were; or act as a distraction and risk alerting the entire palace to their presence if they didn’t already know they were there?

If they only saw her then they might not even realise there were others nearby though. She was the only one who had been marked out by the spy-beasts after all.

This was a risk she would have to run,

Norya grit her teeth and turned back to listen, the sounds were definitely getting closer. She HAD to move right now!

“I-I’m going out there, hopefully they won’t s-see me,” she told them. “But if they do get any closer then I will act as a distraction. I must make sure they don’t find you two.”

Sheero nodded, placing a hand upon sleeping Eida’s shoulder.

Norya carefully emerged from the crevice and began to creep along the rocky caves, keeping to the shadows and close to the walls so that her silhouette would be less visible. She hid herself in a new spot, and listened carefully, peeking out slowly, hoping that her dark cloak would keep her hidden.

The dragging of fabric was not the only sound she was aware of now, there was also the clicking of nails upon stone, and a low snarling. The skeksis was not alone.

She caught sight of them now, a huge skeksis, dressed in varying shades of gold, yellow and green, with heavy ornamental metal constructs weighing down upon its back. Norya recognise them, the scarred eye gave away their identity immediately as the one who had briefly caught her the night before. She shuddered at the memory and pressed herself closer to the rocky wall. But more worrying right now was what was accompanying the skeksis. With it there was a snarling animal, a hound, covered in thick fur and with crooked antlers, it strained at a leash the skeksis held tight in its grip. The animal had its snout to the ground, and Norya had no doubt what it was up to.

The others would be found within a matter of minutes or less if she did nothing.

It went completely against all her instincts but she had to do this.

_Coward, you are a damn coward_, she told herself repeatedly as she got to her feet and leapt upwards, bringing both sandaled feet down upon the ground so that the sound echoed sharply through the tunnels.

The hound immediately raised its snout from the ground and snarled. Norya began to back up as the skeksis spotted her, its single clear golden eye now focused squarely on her, lips pulling back to reveal sharp jagged teeth in a satisfied grin. And she was struck at how a face so unlike a gelflings could be so expressive, so easily read, it confused her, filled her with dread, if the skeksis had just been a faceless behemoth it would have been much easier for her to deal with.

Norya didn’t need to see anymore, she bolted, and the instant she did she heard the hound begin to bay, then moments later the skitter of its claws upon the stone ground quickly gaining on her, the skeksis had set it free.

_Good_, she thought, _they had taken the bait!_

_And now she was almost certainly dead!_

There was no way she was going to be able to outrun the hound for long, it was practically upon her at this point. She quickly ducked into another crevice, this one was long and very narrow, for a moment the hound ran past, unable to turn as quickly as she could. And in that time she managed to draw her sword, and placed it in front of herself like a pike.

If the hound attempted to charge into here it would skewer itself!

The hound soon returned, it couldn’t quite get its broad back into the narrow gap and instead snapped and snarled at her from the outside, she jabbed it in the nose with her sword but after it nearly bit down on the weapon she decided not to do that again.

Then came a short high-pitched whistle, but it was like no instrument she had ever heard, the sound was harsh and without melody. The hound’s attention immediately snapped away from her, then it withdrew from the crevice and bolted away, she could hear the skittering of its claws quickly fading.

Norya stayed where she was for several minutes, heart racing as she tried to catch her breath again, waiting until she could no longer hear the hound at all.

Why hadn’t the skeksis come looking for her? What had been so important that the skeksis would leave entirely? It hadn’t even gone after the others, she would have surely heard that.

She had to warn the others, the skeksis and hound were probably still nearby and if they found them…

Norya squeezed back out of the crevice and hurried back to the others, not noticing the large shadow watching her.

Eida was awake again on her return to her immense relief, and though she looked deathly pale and shaky, she was clear eyed and lucid. Sheero was sharing the last of their rations with her.

“Norya, thank the Bright Light, you’re okay,” Eida smiled weakly on seeing her.

“We heard the hound,” Sheero told her. “And couldn’t help but fear the worst.”

“I’m fine, really,” she reassured them. “Listen, the skeksis saw me just now, and the only reason I can think why it didn’t pursue me any further is because it’s gone to warn the others! We have to get out of here!”

“There won’t be a second chance for us,” Sheero worried.

“We can’t risk staying here any longer if they know we are here,” Eida said determinedly. “We need to leave as soon as possible. Could you see if it’s dark outside yet?”

“Yes,” Norya said quickly, that was one thing she had noticed. “There was only moonlight.”

“Then let’s get out of here,” Eida agreed.

“Can you stand?”

“I can manage on my own,” Sheero confirmed.

“You’ll need to be my crutch, Norya,” Eida said. “Let’s go, now!”

They made their way out of the crevice, and began to head out, they would need to head up several levels to be able to make the glide over the ravine and hope they did not meet a pack of garthim heading in the opposite direction, but down here they would be trapped.

Such was the hurry, and the awkwardness of the shuffling out of the crevice while carrying a wounded gelfling, that Norya did not notice the skeksis waiting directly outside until it was too late.

The skeksis didn’t shout, or say anything at all, it simply lunged, grabbing Sheero and ripping Eida away from Norya by the neck. Norya stumbled back, looking up with horror as the skeksis violently shook Sheero when she had tried to stab it in the arm, the wooden sword clacking upon the floor as it flew out of her hand.

“That’s enough,” the skeksis boomed at them in a deep voice that seemed to reverberate within the caves around them. “Wretched gelfling, accept your fate! You’re mine now!”

“Norya, get out of here!” Eida cried weakly.

The skeksis paused to look over at Norya indifferently, but made no move towards her as she stared up at it frozen in place. Then the skeksis simply turned and began to walk away, dragging Sheero and Eida after it.

She continued to helplessly stare after them for some moments, then to her surprise she felt anger. Anger at herself for not having realised the skeksis had followed her back, anger at the skeksis for having used her like that, and anger at the unfairness of the situation!

Norya drew her sword and ran ahead, blocking the skeksis’ path. Holding her weapon aloft, she pointed it towards the skeksis’ face, she was no warrior but she would try her best, damn it! Even if the skeksis had the advantage, with greater reach, and being so much bigger than her.

“H-HEY! SKEKSIS!” she shouted. “Let them go! Now! I-I’m only giving you this one chance!”


	3. Chapter 3

The threat sounded even more pathetic in real life than it had done in her head, but Norya refused to budge, right now all that mattered was getting the skeksis as far away as possible from Sheero and Eida. The skeksis seemed to think the threat was amusing too, the fiercely determined look upon its face cracking into a smirk.

“But it looks like I have no hands to spare,” amusement curdling the skeksis’ booming voice as it held forth both Sheero and Eida. “Better leave while you still can, gelfling.”

Norya couldn’t find her voice again, her throat felt like it was full of cotton, she refused to budge from where she stood, hating how weak and helpless she felt.

She had only one advantage in this fight, being so much smaller than the skeksis she was also a smaller target, if she could just avoid its first strike she might have a chance at getting in her first swing. She knew there was no way she would be able to take down the skeksis, but if she could cause it some sort of injury that would hinder its pursuit of them then that was all she needed. She would have aimed for its legs but she couldn’t see where they were beneath all the thick robes. She could perhaps aim for the inside of its elbows and reduce the risk it posed to them, but that wouldn’t slow it down. She could aim for its belly and hope the injury was grave enough that it would prioritise its own health over pursuing them.

The whole idea made her feel sick, and not just out of fear.

Gelflings were pacifists by nature, it was entwined not only into their culture but their very being!

But sometimes there was no choice.

Norya decided she would make for the easiest target and attempt to stab the skeksis in the belly, perhaps then she could grab the others and they could escape. Biting at her lip, she adjusted her footing, readying herself to charge.

_She would only get one chance._

The skeksis at last seemed to take the threat seriously, it gave her only a split moment of satisfaction seeing that smirk melt away, then it tossed Eida and Sheero aside like sacks of rocks, drawing its own sword, a viciously angled metallic lance. Metal was not a material gelflings readily used, not in a long time now, and Norya had no doubt that her fire-hardened wood sword would be no match for it, but since her plan relied entirely on her avoiding being struck, this wouldn’t matter as long as she succeeded.

“Norya, don’t-” Eida began to say.

She charged, putting all her weight her strike as she swung.

There a hard ‘_kathunk’_ of wood striking metal, and Norya felt a sudden sharp pain in her wrist as her sword was knocked back with such force that it flew out of her hands. The skeksis had blocked the blow.

She gasped in pain, staggering back a few steps, clutching at her bruised wrist. Her whole right arm felt as if it had just been rammed into a stone wall. She looked up with wild eyes as the skeksis pointed the lance in her direction.

“T-that wasn’t fair…” was all she could find herself stuttering, and as if from a great distance she was still aware of the other two calling for her to run.

But Norya wasn’t going anywhere, but it wasn’t out of bravery, she felt rooted to the spot. She had tunnel vision, right now all she could see was the skeksis looming before her. The moment she made a move she was certain she was dead.

Then the skeksis simply put its lance away.

Norya was dumbfounded.

“Gelflings are always so predictable,” it told her. “Doomed to failure, you are struggling against something much bigger than yourselves, the ways of the world and all of creation.”

Norya eyes darted over to where her sword had flown, it was on the opposite side of the hall, she was certain the skeksis would catch her before she could get it. The skeksis followed her gaze and made curious rumbling sound in its throat. Perhaps amusement, or irritation?

“I am going to be very generous, brave little gelfling,” it addressed her directly, and Norya couldn’t help but think it was joking in more ways than one. “No skeksis other than I know that any of you remain here, come with me willingly and answer my questions, and I will look the other way when you leave.”

The skeksis’ gaze was piercing, as if it could see through her every thought. Norya was finding it hard to think straight.

“It is a good offer, you would save both yourself and your companions,” the skeksis pressed, showing both palms in a gesture of honesty. Norya noticed with shock that from the elbow down, the skeksis’ left arm was entire metallic. “Don’t you want to return home?”

“I-”

“Don’t, Norya, it’s a trap,” Eida had limped over to grasp her shoulder, she whispered urgently in her ear. “He will ask for the locations of our tribes, our plans, our numbers, and when you refuse to give the information to him, he will harm you until you do or until you die! Then he will come back for us!”

Norya swallowed and took a deep breath, looking away to where Sheero was now limping towards them. She pushed Eida towards her, mind made up.

“Get out safely, don’t do anything stupid,” Norya told them both, loud enough for the skeksis to hear.

Eida’s only protest was to weakly strike Norya upon the shoulder, letting out a sob of anger and frustration.

“I will not betray anyone,” Norya leaned towards them, whispering. “I will find a way, my chances are better than yours, I’m not injured. Just let me buy you time, and get out of here while I distract him!”

She took off the green eye-pendant from around her neck, and pressed it into Eida’s hand.

“And you had better both be waiting for me with the others when I get there,” Norya added, trying to stop her voice from wavering. “Because if you aren’t, I’m… I’m going to be so annoyed at you!”

Eida wouldn’t look at her, but Sheero gave a determined nod. The skeksis made an impatient huffing sound behind her.

Norya turned from them and stepped towards the waiting skeksis.

“I accept your offer,” she told him.

Norya couldn’t help but shrink back as the skeksis advanced, he crouched down so that they were eye-level, she fought the urge not to run, not to react as the skeksis reached for her. To her confusion, he took a firm but not rough hold of her left hand and raised it, then he pressed calloused clawed fingertips against her own in an ancient gesture that she almost didn’t recognise, it was a sign of mutual agreement.

“Good, you made a wise decision,” he rumbled, then his hand moved to engulf her left shoulder and he began to lead her away. Norya couldn’t bring herself to look back at the other two, fearing that if she did then her resolve would crumble.

\-------

The skeksis led her up several levels of the palace in silence, keeping a firm grip on her to ensure that she couldn’t get away if changed her mind. Not that Norya was actively resisting but she was growing increasingly more nervous with every moment that passed, her thoughts in a mindless panic. What if the skeksis intended to take her, the most able-bodied of the gelflings, to be fed to the Crystal first? Then he could easily be able to return and retrieve her two injured companions if he was quick enough about it, and even if he wasn’t, all he would have to do was alert the rest of the palace and they would send the garthim after them.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked shakily, they had to be near ground-level now, she could see moonlight glinting off the edge of the ravine outside.

“Not to the Crystal’s light if that is what you fear,” he gave her a knowing look. “Besides, at this time of day it would not work. We’re heading to somewhere more secure, where we will not be spied on.”

“Spied on?” Norya felt seriously confused by this statement. Did the skeksis have enemies besides the gelfling? Surely not the podlings, the mere idea was laughable, when it came to pacifism _the podlings were even worse than the gelflings_!

The skeksis merely made some deep rumbling sound in his throat, which Norya now realised was laughter. He didn’t answer her question.

They soon reached a large warmly lit chamber, Norya’s eyes immediately widened in shock as she noticed the countless large skulls of fanged and tusked animals mounted upon its walls. There were fur skins upon the floor, and hung over furniture, and countless bones of animals neatly organised into morbid collections, parts of preserved animals too were there, paws, eyes in jars, entire insects, shiny beetle shells and few odd taxidermized animals that almost looked alive. There was one large table, on which a jagged vicious knife had been stabbed into the wood, grimy blood stains still on the table surface, it was clear that the skeksis prepared his own trophies.

She looked up at the skeksis again, now with new fear. She could see no trace of gelflings amongst the trophies, but was it really such a farfetched thought that he might take one?

Besides the morbid displays, there was also a large skeksis-sized chair made of bony ivory, either side of which were two immense steaming cauldrons of embers, she could feel the heat as soon as she walked into the room, winter had yet to leave outside and it had been cold beneath the palace. Beside the chair was a small table with several steaming dishes upon it, the harsh sweaty scent of cooked meat made her crinkle her nose. Beside the small table, a blank-eyed podling stood lifelessly to one side waiting, a jug in its withered hands.

The skeksis at last let go of her shoulder, smacking his lips with gusto at the sight of food, he moved over to his chair, dropping himself into it heavily and pulling the table towards himself, he began to dig in. Norya watched in confused silence, it was almost as if the skeksis had forgotten she was there. She looked anxiously at the drained podling again, which hadn’t made a single movement since they had arrived.

The skeksis finally seemed to remember her, and looking up he snapped something in the vernacular at the podling, snatching the jug off it and shoved it away. The podling immediately wandered out.

“Like me, the Emperor is also very generous,” the skeksis looked back at her, popping something wriggling into his mouth that crunched when he bit down. “He knows I will be working late tonight on my projects, so I get to dine here away from the others. No interruptions allowed.”

She looked away, not knowing what to say. The skeksis huffed impatiently, picking at his food.

“Take,” he ordered, leaning upon the small table, which creaked beneath his weight, a baked sweet tuber held out to her in one clawed hand.

Norya anxiously trotted over, eyes downcast, and took the red fruit, all the while very conscious of how much bigger his hand was than hers as she accidentally brushed against it, the claw-like nails lightly scuffing at her skin. He had the strength to kill her near instantly if he wanted to, she thought, no wonder the skeksis had been seen with such reverence when they had first appeared.

“Sit,” he instructed her, indicating a large sealed chest over to his right, upon it an animal skin of some kind had been thrown. Norya did her best to ignore this morbid fact as pulled herself up and sat down. She looked back at him from her perch, fruit still in her hands. The skeksis had gone back to his late meal, tearing with relish into piece of meat dripping with gravy, sharp teeth flashing, he considered her with his one good eye.

Norya looked away again, trying to quickly think her plan over. She would answer some questions, she decided, but nothing that might compromise the safety of her fellows, and she wasn’t stupid enough to think that the skeksis didn’t already know she planned this. No doubt he would threaten her or the others if she didn’t cooperate, but if she could somehow prevent him from having this leverage then there would be nothing he could do to make her talk. She needed to stall for time, as long as she could, and hope the other two could manage to escape without her. She eyed the fruit.

She hadn’t eaten much that day, the rations they had been carrying were meagre and had only been meant to last the journey back. Norya hesitantly took a bite and was pleasantly surprised at its sweetness. It hadn’t just been roasted, it had been poached, leaving her fingers sticky, it was sweeter than anything she had ever tried before, soft and flavoured with deep rich spices. She had finished eating it before she had even realised. Wiping her mouth with her sleeve in embarrassment as she realised the skeksis was still watching her.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked her.

Norya shook her head. She could have made a guess, but she didn’t want to risk it. As a storyteller, and with a passion for all stories whether fictional, historical or biographical, she had made it her business to learn all the names of the skeksis lords in the Crystal Palace. But hearing of skeksis in old story tales was very different than meeting one in person, and she had no idea who the skeksis in front of her was. The professions of the skeksis had all changed throughout history, the ones she could recall did not appear to match up with what she had seen with this skeksis so far. She guessed he was a hunter of some sorts, or perhaps this was just his hobby. Maybe he was an animal trainer? Or some sort of morbid skeksis interior decorator?

Leading off the main chamber she could see a smaller room, inside she could glimpse the edge of a bed and a second large desk, but from here she couldn’t see what was on it. The skeksis had mentioned he was supposedly working tonight, unless by that he meant interrogating her.

“I am Census-Taker skekLach,” he told her, leaning heavily upon the table again so that it groaned. “Or rather that is the title the gelflings would have last known me by, around a century ago. Amongst my brethren I am known as the Collector.”

_SkekLach_? Wasn’t that the name of the skeksis that had helped during the Namopo Valley rescue a few months before? Norya’s eyes widened, perhaps… perhaps things might not have been bad as they seemed. Bu then again, it was unclear why the skeksis had done this and if it had been really been an altruistic action.

“I am considered a friend to gelfling, or so I’ve been told,” he remarked, corner of his mouth twitching. “But whether you trust me or not, you will serve me.”

Norya had recalled now that the skeksis described as skekLach had been wearing deep red robes with broaches cluttering his chest, whereas the skeksis in front of her didn’t have a single red garment on him nor seemingly any interest in jewellery. Furthermore, she had heard no mention of such a huge facial scar, and it was quite a distinctive feature. So, either the skesis who had rescued the villagers was not skekLach, or this skeksis was lying about his name in hope that it would make her more amenable to his questions.

She thought back to every single tale she had heard about the skeksis, and the one referred to as skekLach. Many of the stories were told in rhyme and song, it was the easiest way to remember them when paper was a valuable resource and so easily destroyed, she began to recite one such verse in her head and deciphered its contents. SkekLach historically had been a skeksis who had worked with population census taking, but he had also taken note of crops and livestock output, relaying such information back to the palace and between the gelflings themselves so that they could better manage their resources. The end of the verse was rather unflattering.

“I-I know the name,” Norya told him, then added without thinking. “History says you used to eat half a village’s supplies when you visited.”

Then she immediately flinched. WHY had she said _THAT_?!

The air in the chamber was immediately shaken by a deep throaty booming laugh, skekLach nearly bent double as he shoved the table aside and turned to truly look at her.

“What can I say? When hospitality is offered, I take it,” he guffawed. “I am surprised you know the name, most gelflings do not differentiate between us. Are you perhaps a strategist for your tribe?”

“I’m a storyteller,” she told him, and swore she saw a flicker of disappointment on the skeksis face, feeling embarrassed she quickly added. “I-I do my best to learn everything about all I can. Everything, when looked at in the right angle, holds a story of its own after all…” She wasn’t sure where she was going with this sentence, and trailed off awkwardly, feeling heat rushing to her face and ears in embarrassment.

“You are clever one then, for a gelfling, most don’t care for anything but music and dancing,” he told her patronisingly. “Do you know too then, of the prophecy? That states gelflings will kill skeksis?”

She nodded once.

“Do you believe it?”

“I-I…” the truth was Norya had no idea if she did, she did tend to be a bit on the superstitious side of things but she was also ultimately a pessimist at heart, something she had always wanted to change. “No.”

“Then we share something in common,” skekLach took a swing from a tapering flask of wine and looked over at her with interest. “No simple gelfling could ever bring an end to our rule!”

She looked up him uneasily, and he offered a jagged smile in return.

“And that is a good thing for both gelfling and skeksis, don’t be mistaken,” he went on. “For I don’t foresee only death for both sides. Unfortunately, my brethren tend to think differently. But essence is an ever harder to obtain resource and it would be very unwise to wipe out all gelflings, it must be made sure they can be procured in a sustainable way. This way both skeksis and gelfling win, the Emperor gets to keep his supply of essence and the gelflings carry on living, relatively undisturbed. Do you see where I’m coming from?”

“But gelflings would still be taken-” Norya did understand, and she was horrified the skeksis could speak of such a prospect so calmly.

“Gelflings must be fed to the Crystal, there is no other way,” skekLach said dismissively. “But it can be done sustainably, there is no need for gelflings to be wiped out. If it could be managed, this would save gelflings from certain annihilation!”

Norya didn’t know how to reply to that, so she just quietly asked. “How am I involved?”

The skeksis tossed her another fruit, which she gladly caught.

“As per our agreement, I’m going to ask you a few simple questions,” skekLach told her. “All you need to do is answer them, and then I will look the other way as you and your companions leave.”

“And if I don’t answer the question?” she asked nervously.

“Then you yourself are free to go, I won’t stop you,” he told her smirking, then narrowed his eyes at her. “But your friends will not be coming with you. Don’t be naïve now, I saw the state the older one was in. Do you really think you could run far with her in that state? If you get caught, then all three of you would be imprisoned right away, and there will be no escape. The mistake with the Namopo Valley tribe will never be made again!”

“I’m not leaving them,” Norya said quickly.

“Then answer this,” skekLach begun, smiling so that sharp hooked teeth glinted in the firelight. “The last gelfling permanent village fell many decades ago, but quite a few nomadic ones still remain. You are from one such group, aren’t you?”

Norya knew she needed to play for time and weighed up the dangers associated with answering this question. It was a harmless one.

“Yes.”

“What village are you from?”

“…Redleaf,” she couldn’t see any harm in sharing the name, it gave nothing away about where they were located.

The skeksis fished out a small ledger from one of his pockets, flicking through the worn pages until at last he came to a stop and looked up at her.

“Redleaf was raised to the ground and raided more three years ago,” he told her. “It was destroyed.”

“I escaped,” Norya felt a flicker of anger. “And I wasn’t alone.”

“Many of you, are there?”

This was a question she could not answer directly. Redleaf now consisted of roughly a dozen clanmates and several dozen more from other disbanded tribes. In fact there was more outsiders than clanmates at this point, could it really be called Redleaf anymore?

“There are enough,” she said evasively.

“I want an estimate, and location,” the skeksis cut to the chase. “Answer me these two questions and you can go. Tell me the location of other tribes, and I might even help your companions escape.”

Norya stared at him wide-eyed, her mouth clamped shut. The corner of the skeksis’ mouth twitched, she gulped.

“I can’t,” she said quietly.

“Are you sure of that?” skekLach got to his feet and moved to loom over her. “Is that your final decision? To break our agreement?”

In that moment she felt a strange form of envy as she looked up at him. The skeksis were so much bigger than them, so much stronger, so much more driven, if gelflings had had that power, if she had had that power, if she wasn’t a weak little coward, then maybe she would have been able to do something to change the tides of the gelflings’ fate.

“Please don’t…” she began to beg, shrinking back against the crate.

“I win either way, as I’m sure you have realised by now,” he leant forward, plucking one of the black creatures from her sleeve then letting it spring back into place. “I don’t need your agreement for that.”

“Are there no other questions I could answer?” she implored.

“What else could you have possibly thought I would ask,” skekLach guffawed. “If I had wanted your essence and nothing more, I would have struck you down where you stood, then dragged you gelflings back into the palace. The Emperor wants you all dead, but you are fortunate I don’t think the same way.”

“I can’t do it,” she said with a shaky voice. “They would all still die.”

“You heard me before, didn’t you? I have no desire to see gelflings extinct,” he took a step back from her, giving her room for just a moment before extending his good hand to rest it upon her head, surprisingly gently, but dangerously heavy, dangerously strong. Norya froze, unsure what he was doing, whether it was a threat or some twisted attempt to comfort her. “You just need to answer three simple questions, and you will save everyone. You will get to return to them, return to your tribe, don’t you want to go home without guilt?”

She would have given anything to be able to relax and tell herself everything would be alright, the skeksis’ words sounded so honest, so simple. But it was a trick, it was all a trick!

“Do you have visions of a future? Of loving family, of a happy village? Or do you see the same world that the Emperor does, and foresee only death?”

Despite the danger, it felt almost hypnotic to be so close to one of these beings, she realised, lives so long as to be incomprehensible to any mere mortal. Hidden behind that monstrous visage there was something otherworldly. She had heard tales that in the earliest days that the skeksis had practically glowed with a radiant light reminiscent of the urskeks. She could almost see that now, even with the twice four centuries that had passed.

Skeksis had once been thought to be immortal, but the gelflings knew at least one of their kind had fallen. Tossed out of the palace with barely a scrap of cloth to their name, the banished skeksis had found no welcome amongst the nomadic gelflings, and in time they had vanished. Skeksis were mortal just like the rest of them, they just stole time from the Crystal.

The huge warm clawed hand moved down to cup at the side of her face, her gaze shot up to look at him, the skeksis seemed amused by her reaction. She could really see now how the skeksis must have convinced the gelflings of their good nature in the beginning. Gelflings were a pacifist race by nature, weapons had only ever come into existence in times of extreme danger, and even then they were used poorly and reluctantly. When the skeksis had first turned on them, no gelfling had even thought to fight back. It was in their nature to trust kind and friendly behaviour, liars amongst gelflings were a rarity, and this skeksis, he was talking like he was reasonable, like he was a friend, like he was to be trusted, and in her heart she knew wanted to trust him. It was just her nature. There life in that eye of his, emotions, ambition, feeling and thought, and so many untapped stories. Not like the cold hard shell of garthim, who were more lifeless than even the stillest of rocks.

With a great effort she leaned away from his touch, suddenly shaking.

It was so incomprehensible to her that something conscious, something with so much life, could play so casually with the idea of ending so many lives. It felt so unnatural, so utterly alien. How could anyone be okay with doing that?!

“There is something I am curious about,” the skeksis told her, withdrawing his hand. “When we first…met, you did something that surprised me. Something that I did not know a gelfling could do.”

Norya fidgeted uncomfortably, crossing her arms and looking away. How could she have forgotten, the vision, the dreamfast…

“You see, in my…,” skekLach seemed to be trying to think of the right term. “Younger trine. I learnt from gelflings how to listen to animals, and in turn they could understand my orders, they called it _soul speech_. I had noticed similarities with dreamfasting, but that was something no gelfling could ever teach me.”

“You want me to teach you?” she asked, looking up in surprise. “Would you let the others go then?”

The skeksis went quiet for a moment.

“I would consider it.”

“It’s inherent to our kind, I’m not sure if it even can be taught,” Norya looked down and wrung her hands nervously. “I-I will probably not be a good teacher.”

“That’s not an issue, I am a very quicker learner.”

“I-I, it’s not that I don’t want to,” she suddenly feeling extremely ashamed, dreamfasting was not something she liked to talk about with anyone, she didn’t want others to know that she couldn’t dreamfast, such a vital missing form of communication inherent to gelflings, she felt broken without it. She evaded saying what was on her mind. “I don’t know what happened earlier, gelflings are not meant to be able to dreamfast with skeksis, I had never even heard of that happening before-”

“And that makes you special, only you can offer me this,” he told her, stepping away from her and moving back to the chair, gesturing for her to come to him “Do you accept?”

“Of course I do,” she said quickly, she slid off the wooden chest, and wringing her hands as she moved towards him, raising one hand to him in offering. “I will try my best.”

Norya squeaked as skekLach ignored her hand and took a hold on her entire forearm, pulling her forward and up off the ground.

“Just pretend I’m another gelfling,” he told her pulling her up onto his lap, startling her, she quickly adjusted herself to sit balance upon his legs. Before she had enough time to decide how she felt about this and if it was completely inappropriate, he placed his hand upon her lap, palm turned harmlessly upwards to her. “Show me a tale, storyteller.”

Norya hesitated for just a moment, immensely aware of the skeksis’ presence at her back, then she placed her hands upon his. His long clawed fingers immediately flex closed around her hands like a trap. There was no immediate reaction, nothing changed, and she shakily adjusted the position of her hands so that the palm of her right hand lined up with his. But still nothing happened, as it had always been whenever she had tried to dreamfast throughout her entire life.

“I don’t know how,” she said anxiously, beyond her control tears were beginning to well up. “I-I don’t know what happened before!”

“You did it before, show me again.”

A heavy metallic hand rested down upon the back of her cloak, between her wings. Was that meant to be comforting, or a threat that he would tear her wings off if she let him down? Norya honestly didn’t know. There was a sense of danger that she could not ignore, but right now she needed comfort, just some kind word, even if it was from a skeksis, even if it wasn’t real. Pathetic, she thought to herself, she pushed her back against the touch and did her best to focus.

Suddenly it was like she was falling headfirst into a whirlpool.


	4. Chapter 4

For a moment she felt pure unadulterated elation, this was dreamfast! She was dreamfasting! It was something beyond words, something she really couldn’t describe, she no longer felt she had a distinct body, she simply existed in this space, as if she was floating, yet at the same time she was also very conscious of her body in the real world, still sat upon the chair with skekLach. He was there too of course, she couldn’t see him, but she could sense him there, like shadow. But here skekLach was a lot less of an overbearing presence, she no longer got the impression of being so much smaller than him, they were both simply just there as two dimensionless entities.

They were in a memory, one of her early ones. It felt natural yet so strange to her, seeing the scene playing out again before her, like it was happening once more, for the first time. The edges of the memory were not clear, she had the distinct impression of things being there, the hard bumpy trunk of the tree beneath her feet, the wind watching at her wings, the foliage brushing at her face and arms as she climbed, but she could not see individuals leaves or count the number of branches, these were things she had forgotten.

In the memory she was a tiny thing, her wings still so small they barely reached her hip. She, and therefore skekLach, looked down at a frustrated shout from below, Norya’s father looked up at her with concern, directly below her, her two younger brothers were trying to follow her up the tree.

“Norya, get down from there, you will hurt yourself,” her father chastised, hurrying to stop the two young boys from copying her.

Thinking of her family, her thoughts then jumped to another memory of them. The transition was smooth and without interruption, now she was meeting the Redleaf tribe for the first time, she began to dive through the memories quickly, like flicking the pages of a book, now she was evading garthim, finding food, sleeping by an extinguished fire, hiding in the caves and hoping no garthim could reach them there, her youngest brother trying to braid her hair but getting it all lopsided, trying to learn how to sow clothes from her father, running from garthim. Hiding from garthim, escaping from garthim, fearing garthim.

Now they were by the edge of a wood, she was no longer a child. Only one brother remained.

“Are you choosing what you show me?” skekLach suddenly asked, for a moment she had forgotten he was there, so swept up in the memories of days long gone. “Or is this instinctive?”

“I’m not choosing,” Norya replied, and unbidden her treacherous mind revealed a series of memories showing that she had never been able to dreamfast before and all the shame she felt from it, and all the times she had done her best to avoid contact with others so that she could avoid letting them know. The skeksis hummed in consideration. “I think the memories are connected by a random thread. A theme. I think that if I try-”

“So you don’t know any more about dreamfasting than me,” the skeksis interrupted. “Is this your family?”

“Yes, they were,” she was taken off guard. “My small but perfect family.”

“And what happened to them?”

Norya had no intention of answering him, but now that the thought was planted, she couldn’t redirect it, she had no control of it.

They now were in a ruined field. The ground was torn and uneven beneath her sandals, the thick smoke burned at her eyes and throat. Flattened makeshift tents were trampled into the ground, the flames of campfires that had gotten free now burnt lowly upon the camp. She ran through, it stumbling, searching, crying. Norya recoiled from the memory, but there was no way to hide from this burning bright light, from the reality of the situation, she couldn’t even close her eyes.

There were a few survivors nearby, tending to the wounded, but she herself was alone. She looked frantically between their faces, seeking out her father, Eida and her younger brother, then finding none of them she sought out her brother’s family. They were not there either.

A string of memories sprung forth uncalled for, of her and her small family unit travelling alone until then. It was the best way to avoid the garthim. Then the face of an older female gelfling swam into view, and of her love struck father. Eida. Eida and her father had married, and as one of the village elders she had taken them into her village, Redleaf. For as long as Norya had known, her family had travelled alone, suddenly they were offered the chance to be with other gelflings. Norya had even been excited at the prospect.

But being in a bigger group in had only meant they were a bigger target for the garthim.

She had never found out what happened to her family. Though Eida had later escaped, she had returned alone, stony-faced and silent.

Norya felt numb. Mercifully, for the moment, the memories stopped coming. SkekLach though, was up to something.

“I see,” he murmured to himself. “So subconsciously you control what you show me by thinking of it, though it’s beyond your control? So you are both in control and not. I wonder if I can directly influence you too. Tell me, why did you come to the palace?”

Norya’s thoughts unravelled beyond her control once more. It all moved back to Eida coming to her to offer her the position on the group, together they would change the world, gelflings would be able to live in peace once more. Those damn crystal shards. The prophecy. _Heal the Crystal!_

Norya was terrified now, forgetting her sorrow in that moment she realised she had been tricked. SkekLach didn’t just want to learn to dreamfast, he planned to use it as a tool against her, if she would not give him the information he sought then he would take it from her!

“It wouldn’t have worked,” skekLach laughed as he watched the previous night’s events from her eyes play out. “Even if you had the shard, and had somehow healed the crystal, what would have stopped skeksis from cracking it once more? Its fracturing did not create us, contrary to some myths. The cracking did not happen until after our birth!”

And for a moment Norya saw something that was not one of her memories. They were in the Crystal Chamber once more, it was dark, the stone floor was cold and hard beneath her hands, there was a terrible ringing sound in the air, she, now as skekLach, was completely naked but for some torn pieces of white fabric around his neck, no opulent jewellery or materials, covering his head with clawed but not yet gnarled hands. Young, strong, and full of anger, confusion and frustration, yes oddly also elation.

“I did not expect to see this,” the skeksis seemed taken aback. “When the Crystal cracked, it let out a terrible wail, some say the sound still echoes within the palace walls… YOU have no right to look at this!!!”

Norya felt herself being withdrawn from the memory abruptly, she shuddered at the sudden anger in the skeksis voice.

“That’s more like it,” skekLach was satisfied with the result. “Let’s see what else you know.”

“This isn’t fair!” she protested. “You said you just wanted me to teach you how! It was meant to be an alternative to me answering these questions!”

“I said I would consider it, we still have an agreement that you would answer my questions,” the skeksis sounded amused. “Why else do you think I would want to learn dreamfasting? I’m curious, yes, but to peer into another’s mind without barrier, with no room for deception, misdirection or lies? What a GIFT you bring me!”

“This is not meant to be how it works!” Norya protested. “Dreamfasting is meant to go both ways, like a conversation, not an interrogation!”

“Show me your tribe,” skekLach asked indifferently.

Immediately they were in a forest clearing near a big river, there a few dozen gelfling there, some harvesting shallowkelp from the water, their dwellings hidden within the muddy banks, completely invisible from above. The village of Redleaf.

To Norya it felt like she had been struck in the gut, breathless with despair that was quickly curdling into anger. This time the anger didn’t burn out, the embers kept growing. Never before had she felt so used!

“Show me how the skeksis killed the urskeks,” she cried out.

But the scene didn’t change.

“That memory doesn’t exist. We didn’t kill them, they destroyed themselves,” skekLach’s voice echoed dangerously. “How many of gelflings are left?”

The scene still didn’t change.

“That’s not how it works,” Norya felt her confidence growing marginally, at last she was beginning to feel she understand. “I am not part of the village council, I have no memories of a census even if I might know the answer through other means.”

“Gelfling, answer me!”

“You can influence what I show you, but just like you, I can direct things too,” she snapped. “This is how dreamfasting works! There are certain things I know I can’t show you, and just as equally, I can withhold memories if I choose! I just need to figure out how. Can you? I doubt you know anymore how to stop it than I do.”

“Impertinent-”

“When we first met, I saw a city of light, show me more of it!”

The scene immediately changed, they were back in the city of light once more. The skeksis fell silent, but she could still feel him there, irritation and frustration boiling below the surface. Norya got a much better glimpse of the metropolis now, it was a latticework of impossibly tall and thin structures reaching skywards, but even from the dizzying height from which she looked down upon the sea of lights below she saw other details now, like the glowing tall and ethereal people, spoken of as deities amongst the gelflings.

The urskeks.

And there were literally dozens of them, if not hundreds. They were not something special here, not something unusual. More like a seething mass of insects in a hive.

“How do you have this as a memory?” Norya was confused. “Did the urskeks bring you here?”

The scene changed to confusing blur where she could barely distinguish anything, but she was conscious of a terrible pain as if her body was being literally torn in two, as she floated before the bright burning light of the last Great Conjunction, mercilessly cutting at her through the lens of the Crystal.

“Does it hurt?” the skeksis goaded her. “Good! That memory is not yours to take!”

“You’re urskek?!” she cried out.

“I am skeksis!”

Her mind was ablur. She was seeing a story that stretched out in time longer than any life of gelfling ever could, yet it was still relatable, a life with emotions, desires, feelings… only now through the glimpses she was now catching, she was beginning to get the impression that urskeks weren’t meant to feel those.

“Don’t you miss them? The urskeks in the city of light?” she asked, she couldn’t imagine being so far away from everyone and everything she had ever known, why had the 18 original urskeks ever come to Thra?!

She was immediately shown a barrage of images, all with the same ultimate message, of rejection, shame, sadness, fury.

“They didn’t want us!” skekLach growled in her ear. “They wanted us gone! Why would I miss them?! They certainly didn’t miss us.”

Norya realised that the skeksis had lost control of the situation, but she, she now had some control.

“Why did you leave home?!”

“You have no right to ask that, little gelfling!” the skeksis hissed furiously at her, and she was shocked at how vulnerable he sounded. When was the last time a skeksis had ever been at the mercy of a gelfling like this before? Probably never.

She witnessed a dizzying surge of memories, all equally full of anger, fear, frustration, there was so many of them, it was almost overwhelming, hundreds if not thousands of trine’s worth of bad memories. Distant fuzzy memories of the city of light, of a being that felt emotions, desires and feelings, such a thing could be considered natural but expressing them was not, for it was to embody the sin of individuality, the ultimate act of heresy amongst the urskeks, for it embodied all things they deemed bad in the universe. The original 18 urskeks had not left their home voluntarily, they had been banished.

Then the memories were moving forwards, flickering between minor fights and bickering, and then settling on the skeksis were rising to power, they were getting increasingly more elaborate clothing and jewellery, trying to outshine one another, but they were physically slowing down. Fear of aging, death, getting old, and the glow of the Crystal was all that kept them alive, and then the joy at the discovery of essence, but only for the Emperor, only for the Emperor of the skeksis. Gelflings were to be drained of their essence, become withered out husks so that he might live just a little longer-

“Don’t you have any good memories?” she cried out against the storm, but the skeksis didn’t reply, he only shoved more and more terrible memories her way, and she was powerless against it. “Stop it!”

“You wanted them, so take them all,” the skeksis boomed angrily at her.

Norya now realised she could not deny memories nor gain direct control over skekLach, no more than he could her. But dreamfasting was not a way form of communication, she knew, she could still use her own memories to combat this assault and block them out. Outshout the other, so to speak.

She began to think of her own memories, the happiest ones she could muster. Sitting by a campfire, hidden within a cave out of the pouring rains reach while eating soup. Teaching her younger brothers how to repair their own clothes with a bone needle and thread. When Eida had first wrapped her in a warm embrace and told her how happy she was to have her as a daughter, and how happy and accepted it had made Norya feel. Joining a tribe for the first time, knowing now that she might get to make many friends who she could see every day, no longer having to travel in a tiny family group from day to day. Her time telling stories by the fire, and though she had never learnt to play an instrument her words more than made up for it. She could weave new worlds, tell many tales – some perhaps a bit tall – and share an infinite amount of ideas, and in those times even not being able to dreamfast didn’t make her feel that different from the others.

It seemed to be working, skekLach’s flow of memories had slowed right down to a trickle now, her own dominated their shared consciousness.

But then for a moment Norya faltered as she remembered that when her stories were told and the food and music over, when she had bowed and ducked away from the fire, she would slink off to be alone, too nervous and uncomfortable to stay amongst the others telling their own tales. She would never be able to share her memories or thoughts with her friends, let alone a mate. Who could ever want or trust gelfling who could not dreamfast? And now that she could, but with a skeksis alone, she didn’t know how to feel about it anymore.

“You should be glad,” skekLach snapped at her. “This is obviously a weakness, a highly invasive one!”

“Not when you know how to control it,” Norya replied, indifferent to his threat now. “We’re both still learning.”

And she continued to barrage him with every single memory she had of her family and herself, not just good but bad and everything in between now, from her earliest memory, and all as detailed as possible but being careful to avoid anything that might further compromise the lives of her clanmates.

“What are you doing?!” the skeksis was growing alarmed. “Stop it!”

“You said you wanted them, so take them all,” she echoed back to him. “You’ve seen my moments of greatest weakness, so why stop there? Have all of me! My very life, my entire story!”

In reality, she felt the skeksis’ grasp upon her hands loosen but she held on tightly and he was unable to resist her.

Beyond his control, the skeksis began to reciprocate the flow of memories, she began to see his every recollection unfiltered. She learnt he was a tactician, a strategist of sorts for the skeksis, directly responsible for orchestrating many of the acquisition raids. During the times of peace he had held the title of Census Taker in public to appear more amiable, then in more recent times he had acquired the title of Collector, as a favour by the Emperor himself, to reflect skekLach’s truest interest. SkekLach had an obsession with all things rare and unique, particularly things that were or had once been alive. He liked to collect them, preserve them, keep them. This didn’t always work out for him, she caught a brief glimpse of the face of a gelfling with the same spy-creatures upon his shirt as on her, skekLach had hoped he would be a good spy but the spy-creatures had never returned. But if she reached further back, so far back that it was almost beyond gelfling comprehension, she saw different things, of a glowing being who was frustrated and goalless, but he did nothing, it was fear that stayed his hand. He stayed in dark rooms where there was little light, sorting through shelves and class cabinets of oddities, sorting them into collections, minding to care for them. Others of his kind similarly unhappy were not so eager to keep quiet. He was both thrilled and frightened by their talks, he resented the idea of committing to them fully, it was heresy. But he would end up going regardless, feeling some satisfaction in sharing what tales of old he knew, to bring joy and to entertain the crowds of the fallen like him.

“You were a storyteller too?” she asked.

“That isn’t me!” skekLach snapped furiously at her, but his voice now wavered.

“But it is you! These are your memories! Your story!”

The skeksis didn’t respond, and this time she knew it wasn’t out of spite, the skeksis felt lost, overwhelmed by her memories and unable to stop sharing more of his as she probed deeper, seeking out more of his memories. It was addictive, there was just so much here to learn, so many experiences beyond her own life, so much more than any gelfling would ever know.

“Please… stop,” the skeksis begged her.

That was like a knife to her heart. SkekLach sounded so pained, so lost, not at all like the booming behemoth, overflowing with confidence and pride she had met earlier that evening. This was enough, she decided, she had delayed long enough, the others should have gotten a good head start by now.

In the real world, she tried to pull her hands from skekLach’s, but found she couldn’t, it was as if she had no strength. She couldn’t move at all.

“I can’t!” she told him imploringly. “I’m sorry, I’m trying!”

Every single memory either had ever had continued to pass between them, there was no longer a gate or a filter. It was like a dam had been broken and the more memories that passed through the faster the current became. She too quickly became exhausted and overwhelmed.

Time passed, she couldn’t tell how long, it felt like it could have been years, when finally the connection began to fade on its own, she didn’t realise it until her hands were slipping out of his and she had fallen back against his stomach, head hitting his chest. For several minutes she didn’t move, Norya felt completely overwhelmed, but stories were her livelihood, she knew how to pack them away when she was done, this wasn’t so different. Weakly she was able to slide her way off his lap and stand on shaky legs, looking up at him once more.

SkekLach was catatonic.

He was alive, she could see that, eyes wide open and chest heaving, but it appeared that he had not coped as well as she had with the dreamfasting process. If her own thoughts hadn’t still been reeling, she might have thought the situation was highly ironic given how skekLach had been the one to request the dreamfast in the first place.

Norya was aware though, even having never managed to dreamfast before, that it had not been normal what she had just gone through. Dreamfasting was meant to be like holding a conversation, easy, intuitive, and not at all invasive. You could choose what you shared and what you withheld without a thought. It was purest and most beautiful forms of communication, no room for lies and no room for judgement, you chose what you shared. She highly doubted part of dreamfasting was ever supposed to involve taking in every single one of each other’s memories.

SkekLach blinked, his one good eye had moved now to focus on her.

“These are not my memories,” he spat harshly, the skeksis slumping further in his decorative chair. “These are not-, these are not mine!”

Norya felt compelled to go to him, to help him, but she stilled her shaking hands and began to back away from him. Curse her compassion, curse skekLach for tricking her and for being the only one who she would ever be able to share her memories with, and curse this stupid failed mission! The Crystal would never be healed! The urskeks had brought all the suffering of their homeworld with them and poisoned Thra, and now it was doomed! They would just have to do what they always did, and carry on until the bitter end.

Norya turned to walk away, but it was only then, as she looked down, that she noticed the faint glow emanating from her bag. Sheero’s bag, the bag of crystals! Surprised, confused and everything in between, Norya opened the satchel and looked within, to her shock she saw that one shard was glowing as if with a life of its own.

Before this glow, the spy-beasts upon her sleeves suddenly sprang free as if in terror, they scuttled around the room on their sticky legs, vanishing behind the teeth of old skulls and into cracks between furniture. But Norya paid no attention to them, staring with awe as she realised what she had in her grasp.

She picked out the shard and raised it to eye level, the faint dark purple glow matched that of the Crystal exactly, she saw it now glinting in the firelight, but slowing fading, becoming clear once more. Though there were five others, Norya had no doubt that this was the one shard that Eida had not gotten to try on the Crystal. Of all the luck-

“The shard!” skekLach bellowed, his gaze was now focused on the crystal too, immediately he lurched to his feet, reaching for her, but still unsteady on his feet he tripped on his own long robes and fell.

Norya backpedalled several steps, looking down at the skeksis with sadness and disdain as she stuffed the shard back into the bag, keeping it separate from the others.

“I did as you asked,” she said firmly, voice no longer wavering. “I fulfilled your offer. You have everything now, everything I could ever give, every story, every thought and every dream. I think I will go now, I’ve more than earned it. Farewell, skekLach, LachSen.”

“Norya…”

She darted off into the palace, heart thudding in her chest, looking back once and regretting it deeply. The skeksis still lay upon the floor, reaching after her.

_Focus, focus, focus!_ She told herself.

Norya searched for Sheero and Eida where she had last seen them, but couldn’t find a trace of them. She could only hope this was a good thing, as she clambered out of a window on one of the highest sublevel and dove into an upwards glide, using the thermal of rising warm air from the bubbling springs below to push her higher and up above the mesa top.

The gelflings of Redleaf were no longer safe where they were. She had to warn them. It would be time, once more, to move.

But things would find a way, she was sure of it, she would get back to them first. And now she was certain that the gelflings really did hold in their hands the key to their survival, for she had the crystal shard! She moved out over the dark planes surrounding the palace, drawing out the glide as long as she could before she hit the ground running, twisting her ankle as she hit it at an odd angle, but she was quickly able to shake this off and carry on, dark cloak quickly helping her to vanish once more into the shadows.

In the Crystal Palace, skekLach who had crawled back into his chair, squawked at the unexpected pain in his ankle.


End file.
